Watch Dogs from Ubisoft - The Bear and Badger

Bollockoff

I'd actually prefer this if it had barely any gunplay and you had to use your wits and magic talking brick to escape situations.

regmcfly

It's the gunplay that put me fully off it.

Bollockoff

Yeah, it's awful looking. It is an E3 build though so have to cut them a wee bit of slack. But i'm just bored of shooting that's thrown in for the fuck of it.

Let me play a savant who's so inept at anything other than electronics and coding so he can't have normal dialogue with NPCs and has to run/hide at every encounter. And he can't use a gun without shakey anxiety aim all over the place and forgetting to cock it.

Choke

regmcfly wrote:

Dishonored. Pikmin. Beyond. Sim City.

Fair enough - my comment though was aimed more at the general paucity of content on show - of course fresh IP such as Watch Dogs (or even, Star Wars 1313) will attract attention.

Raiziel

regmcfly wrote:

I just... don't get it. Firstly, it's running on a PC, so temper your expectations of what this will look like on PS3 and 360 waaayyyy down (and Wii U lol if it comes). Secondly, there is nothing random about that encounter - it's all very procedural, even down to the mapping of the cars after the crash, creating a little maze. I think we will see this game go away, and come back as something else, as is the Ubi way.Â It's Assassin's Creed with a phone. Calm down, all.

Yes the visuals will take a hit in order to fit onto the 360 and PS3, but I'll put money on this also releasing on Nextbox and PS4. Â While I agree that it all looks very procedural, that's just the done thing with many E3 game demos. Â Singling this game out for that is a bit daft.

regmcfly

But then singling it out for praise is equally daft.

Raiziel

It's a new IP and it looked gorgeous, which was enough to get my attention. Â Yes it's all a bit Assassin's Theft Auto, it stood out in a mire of sequels.

regmcfly

Did 1313 stand out for you?

Raiziel

Only saw about sixty seconds of that, but the shiney graphics did.

pantyfire

Did no one else notice the way the bodyguards instantly open up on the protagonist when he has done nothing to give himself away after the crash? Leads me to believe the whole thing will have clever scripted gameplay giving the illusion of procedural or on-the-fly gameplay.

MattyJ

It's annoying when that happens in games. If they don't know who you are or what you look like they shouldn't shoot. Breaks immersion.

ChattinWithChet

Not sure of the combat, but this looks very interesting. In spite of the little issues they had, the Assassin's Creed games are some of my favourite of the last many years. They have a wonderful sense of place, and make exploring the world as enjoyable as any open world titles. This has the potential to do something equally exciting. I do like the stuff around discovering people's lives and all that. Very Minority Report.

Paul the sparky

pantyfire wrote:

Did no one else notice the way the bodyguards instantly open up on the protagonist when he has done nothing to give himself away after the crash? Leads me to believe the whole thing will have clever scripted gameplay giving the illusion of procedural or on-the-fly gameplay.

I did notice that, but since the lass in the club knew him by sight I can let that go.Â

I'm agreeing with Reg and whoever said 'vapourware', it's got Alan Wake concept trailer written all over it. It looked great but I'm not letting myself get carried away.

ChattinWithChet

Eh, if it gives the impression of on the fly gameplay that's enough for me, if the experience has the right flow to it.

JRPC

I was just watching 'Invisible Walls' on Gametrailers and apparently this stared out life as a Driver game...

three1ne

Matt_82 wrote:

From the show floor. Â Gametrailers video.Â
They also confirm smart phoneÂ integration.

three1ne wrote:

Great. Interest in this has gone way down now.

LazyGunn wrote:

I don't really see why that'd make you lose interest

IÂ wasn'tÂ talking about the smart phone/glassÂ integrationÂ but rather what appears to be a linear mission structure. The first video at E3, if you putÂ scepticismÂ to one side, looks like a robust open world full of manipulatable electrics/signals to go about your business in a manor of different ways. The second video basically confirms that isnt the case at all.

Facewon

I don't claim this idea hasn't been floated before, but I'm wondering if one way to get around the scripted v emergent/open world thing is to go for a sort of Dead Rising style set up set over a few hours but which get's replayed. Actually, I'm sure someone must have had a similar thought around the time of Source Code being released.

So you have your open world. You have the story/game go for 3 hours, and you script everything. Woah, hold up. This is what Majora's Mask did, is it not?

So I'll rephrase the question, do we think that a game like this would benefit from a MM style structure? Allowing for things to be approached in all manner of ways, but also allowing the dev to heavily script.

ChattinWithChet

Sounds like the way to go alright.

ChattinWithChet

I think Bioware got a great middle ground in the Mass Effect games. Feeling you have an impact is more important than having an impact that you don't care about. The only games that have really done this for me so far are heavily scripted games.

Skerret

Agreed. Â I think open world has become a byword(s) for freedom which is apparently the most desirable trait in a game that fits the basic criteria, i.e. fannying about in a city with cars and ting. Â A tightly scripted gameplay experience can be far more engaging than woolly open world one if done right. Â

Prototype is open world but you get funneled into a certain location anyway if you wish to see the story progress and it all gets rather dull doing the same thing. Â If this provides the sense that you are part of a larger world and manages to hide the wires while doing so, I'll play it. Â

Linear or scripted does not mean predictable or cheap, any more than open world means freedom and endless alternative approaches. Â If the designer/s knows what she/he/they is/are (gawd) doing, I'll place myself in their fist.

dynamiteReady

I would have been more impressed by the game if there were no guns at all.
All you should have is a vantage point, your smartphone, and some mad h4xx0r skillz.

Right now, It just looks like an 'urban' version of GTA (Like 'Streets of LA').

ChattinWithChet

Skerret wrote:

Agreed. Â I think open world has become a byword(s) for freedom which is apparently the most desirable trait in a game that fits the basic criteria, i.e. fannying about in a city with cars and ting. Â A tightly scripted gameplay experience can be far more engaging than woolly open world one if done right. Â Prototype is open world but you get funneled into a certain location anyway if you wish to see the story progress and it all gets rather dull doing the same thing. Â If this provides the sense that you are part of a larger world and manages to hide the wires while doing so, I'll play it. Â Linear or scripted does not mean predictable or cheap, any more than open world means freedom and endless alternative approaches. Â If the designer/s knows what she/he/they is/are (gawd) doing, I'll place myself in their fist.

YOU ARE A RIGHT PERSON HELLOOOOOOOOO

ChattinWithChet

dynamiteReady wrote:

I would have been more impressed by the game if there were no guns at all. All you should have is a vantage point, your smartphone, and some mad h4xx0r skillz. Right now, It just looks like an 'urban' version of GTA (Like 'Streets of LA').

I hear ya, but sometimes big mainstream games with great ideas have things that big mainstream games require, like shooting and combat and all of that. I think of these things as superior examples of mainstream output, rather than a squandered arthouse thing.

adkm1979

Smartphone integration for single player will be ignored contemptuously by me. Â Smartphone integration for a second player versus mode, however, does sound interesting, if it was done in a Left 4 Dead style, taking turns in mini-missions, first you play the protagonist while your pal tries to block your path, then it's your pal's turn to play while you plot against him.

Kazuo

Looking over some of this again, I'm agreeing with Skuzza that an open world game isn't necessarily the best approach for something like this. Looking at Ubi Montreal's take on Deus Ex; that was a tightly scripted mission based game, but with enough freedom of approach to keep things interesting, and open enough that your choices impacted how it was played. I'm comfortably predicting that Watch Dogs will follow this route. Shoehorning it into a completely open world with absolute freedom of choice sound fantastic, but it's too ambitious, especially if Ubi are honest when saying they want to bring it to current gen consoles. The tech's just not there yet. This'll play a bit like Deus Ex: HR meets Assassins Creed, and that in itself sounds good enough to me.

Mod74

I've never played the Ass Creed games but it strikes me this will play like the Hitman games. A set number of pre-defined traps you can trigger to finish the mission.

LazyGunn

'Open world' games have been very tightly scripted for yonks, i cant see this differing a whole lot, i think their rationale is showcasing these trailers to show an environment which seems very open but showing actual gameplay from a strongly scripted moment, given that the usual open world bits of open world games arent really all that exciting enough to make a profound impression. imo.

Facewon

A bit Hitman is also no bad thing.

I'm tempted by the new AC. I haven't played one since AC2, but the new one looks quite spiffy. Although the gameplay in that trailer - yet again - could be completely spoiled by HUD!?!?! all over the shop.

LazyGunn

Did you not do Brotherhood? I found it rather swanky and fun, cept for the closing section/s which were all types of incomprehensible balls

Facewon

nah. Somewhere in the middle of AC2 with all the collecting and the house and the shite I just lost the will to live. Brotherhood added parties and a crew and whatnot, and I just thought: FUCK THAT SHIT. AC1 for all it's flaws, was enjoyable for the getting around. Also, AC2 really didn't fix the major gripe I had with the first one, which was the massively linear way you had to deal with the specific targets.

AC3 may yet turn me off with a bunch of other crap, but bows and arrows and forests are a good start, tbh.

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